Melbourne clinches double in style

Sunday, 18th February 2007 10:13pm

Melbourne Victory became the first team to win the A-League double when it beat Adelaide
United by six goals to nil in the A-League Grand final today at Telstra Dome.

This match exceeds any other match played by Victory at the Dome in terms of entertainment value
and it was goals galore thanks to Archie Thompson. Thompson was the hero of the day and the
official man of the match and rightly so as he scored five brilliant goals. Fred was
involved directly in four of the goals and indirectly in the fifth and he too had a
brilliant game.

I think all in all it was a good day at the office for Melbourne as everything seemed to
work as expected. It wasn't like that for Adelaide though and whilst before the match much
talk was around coach John Kosmina's banishment from the bench, in the match itself the
major talking point is easily the two yellow cards awarded to Adelaide captain Ross Aloisi
resulting in a send-off when the team was already two goals down. Aloisi becomes the first player
to be send off in an A-League grand final.

With the team two goals down and the captain on a yellow card the needless challenge on
Grant Brebner was uncalled for and reckless. I think when Aloisi was leaving the field he
knew that he was leaving his team with an insurmountable task and there would be no way to come back against a clinical Melbourne side.

Adelaide went on to concede four more goals without Aloisi but they could have been more
with at least three shots hitting the woodwork and Danny Allsop squandering two golden
chances in a space of three minutes in the second half.

Kristian Sarkies capped his time on the pitch with the sixth goal in injury time to record a
score which I think will take some time to overtake.

The A-League now goes into a very long off-season but in between Sydney FC and Adelaide will
participate in the Asian Champions League.

I am thinking that maybe next season Victory could play one or two matches at the MCG so that it can get a feel of the turf there. Then when it comes to the grand final and if Victory is hosting it, it could be played at the MCG.

And Aloisi complaining about the second yellow card, that second yellow should have been a straight red anyway.
reply

I actually think it was a good idea to play at the Dome this year but in future if there is demand like this year then maybe the match could be played at the MCG. I agree with you Nick that it would be a good idea to first play some league matches at the MCG first and looking at next season I can't go past the one-off matches against Sydney and Adelaide as the most suitable to give the MCG a trial run. reply

I don't know how a team can lose 6-0 and then go on a tirade against the officials. If it was a 2-1 loss or something close, well, yes you can say we had a chance but not 6-0. Yes, the referee didn't get all the decisions right ( but he got the majority of them right), but that could not have given Adelaide the championship or a sniff of it in any way.

Yes, Thompson was marginally offside when he scored the fourth goal, yes Adelaide's goal should have stood and well that makes it 5-1. The two yellow cards were correct and I totally agree with you Nick. Yes Wes, I also expected an experienced player of Aloisi's calibre to have been more cautious once he was cautioned the first time around. That didn't happen and yes - a send-off.

Adelaide had the chance to score the first goal but what did they do - first a miskick and another chance - shoot tamely into the goalkeeper's hands. Officials to blame for that - no.

That is what they should be concentrating on - how to score. They have scored just two goals in the last 390 minutes of finals football and that's not good enough to win you a championship even if the officials came from Mars.

Sometimes when you lose to an obviously better team its better to hang up your hands in the air and admit defeat and congratulate the other team. That's good sportsmanship for me. reply

Thanks for the comment. With former AFL person in charge, Ben Buckley, then maybe there will be some media training Robbo at least for the captains if its not there already. I would have thought that as professional sportsmen they would have some sort of media training but I am not very sure. Hopefully after Sunday's outbursts something will be set up if there is nothing already at the moment. Cheers. reply

But Kosmina at Adelaide is history now. He probably dug a hole which he couldn't get out. It would be interesting to see if any other A-League team will be interested in his services in future because he is such a good coach. reply

Yes, Roy a friend sounded me on Thursday and later I saw it coming through the feeds but I wasn't surprised. I think one of the problems was that after the Newcastle match he didn't show much respect for the officials and when his captain Aloisi didn't show much respect either at the grand final you could see that now things were a bit out of control. Its good to see that Aloisi has since been relieved of his captaincy.

As for finding another coaching role in the A-League I think he certainly will because to me there is no doubt he is a good coach and his record at Adelaide tells it all. Its off-field where things need to be addressed. What I think though is that he will probably get a role with the new clubs when the A-League expands because he has A-League experience.

I wouldn't expect such a high coach turnover in an eight team league but its happening. Newcastle and Sydney (and probably the Knights) are on their third coaches already! reply

For me and my mates the grand final was our first time at an A-League match and we thought the experience was great. I am not going to say anything about the football but the atmosphere made the whole experience exceptional.

I am already thinking of attending a few more matches next season. reply